217 U.S.

91
30 S.Ct. 481
54 L.Ed. 678

INTERNATIONAL TEXT-BOOK COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v.
AARON T. PIGG.
No. 15.
Argued April 21, 1909.
Decided April 4, 1910.

Messrs. James M. Beck, Seth T. McCormick, and David C. Harrington for

plaintiff in error.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 92-99 intentionally omitted]
No appearance for defendant in error.
Mr. Justice Harlan delivered the opinion of the court:

This action was brought by the International Text-book Company in one of the
courts of Kansas,the court of Topeka,to recover from Pigg, the defendant
in error, the sum of $79.60, with interest, as due the plaintiff under a written
contract between him and that company, made in 1905. The case was tried
upon agreed facts, and judgment was rendered in favor of the defendant for his
costs. That judgment was affirmed in a state district court, which held that the
plaintiff was not entitled to maintain the action, and the latter judgment was
affirmed by the supreme court of Kansas.

It is assigned for error that the final judgmentbased upon certain provisions
of the statutes of Kansas, to be presently referred towas in violation of the
company's rights under the Constitution of the United States.

The facts agreed tousing substantially the language of the partiesmake

substantially the following case:

The International Text-book Company is a Pennsylvania corporation, and the

proprietor of what is known as the International Correspondence Schools at

Scranton, in that commonwealth. Those schools have courses in architecture,
chemistry, civil, mechanical, electrical, and steam engineering, English
branches, French, German, mathematics and mechanics, pedagogy, plumbing,
heating, telegraphy, and many other subjects. It has a capital stock, and the
profits arising from its business are distributed in dividends, or applied
otherwise, as the company may elect. The executive offices of the company, as
well as the teachers and instructors employed by it, reside and exercise their
respective functions at Scranton. Its business is conducted by preparing and
publishing instruction papers, text-books, and illustrative apparatus for courses
of study to be pursued by means of correspondence, and the forwarding, from
time to time, of such publications and apparatus to students. In the conduct of its
business the company employs local or traveling agents, called solicitorcollectors, whose duties are to procure and forward to the company at Scranton,
from persons in a specified territory, on blanks furnished by it, applications for
scholarships in its correspondence schools, and also to collect and forward to
the company deferred payments on scholarships. In order that applicants may
adapt applications to their needs, each solicitor-collector is kept informed by
correspondence with the company of the fees to be collected for the various
scholarships offered, and of the contract charges to be made for cash or deferred
payments, as well as the terms of payment acceptable to the company. In
conformity with the contract between the company and its scholars, the
scholarship and instruction papers, text-books and illustrative apparatus called
for under each accepted application are sent by the company from Scranton
directly to the applicant, and instruction is imparted by means of
correspondence through the mails, between the company, at its office in that
city, and the applicant, at his residence in another state.

During the period covered by the present transaction, the company had a
solicitor-collector for the territory that included Topeka, Kansas, and he
solicited students to take correspondence courses in the plaintiff's schools. His
office in Kansas was procured and maintained at his own expense, for the
purpose of furthering the procuring of applications for scholarships and the
collection of fees therefor. The company had no office of its own in that state.
The solicitor-collector was paid a fixed salary by the company and a
commission on the number of applications obtained and the collections made.
He sent daily reports to the company for his territory, those reports showing
that for March, 1906, the aggregate collections on scholarships and deferred
payments on subscriptions approached $500.

At the date of the agreement sued on, and at the time this suit was brought,
numerous persons in Topeka were taking the plaintiff's course of instruction by

correspondence through the mails. The contracts for those courses were
procured by its solicitor-collector assigned to duty in Kansas, and, as stated,
payments thereon were collected and remitted by him to the plaintiff at
Scranton.
7

The written contract in question, signed by the defendant at Topeka, Kansas,

and accepted by the company at Scranton, showed that he had subscribed for a
scholarship covering a course of instruction by correspondence in commercial
law, and had agreed to pay therefor $84, in instalments. When this suit was
brought, there remained unpaid on the principal of that subscription the sum of
$79.60.

The present action was brought to recover that sum, with interest, as due the
company under the defendant's contract with it. The defendant did not deny
making the contract, nor that he was indebted to the company in the amount for
which he was sued. But it was adjudged, in conformity with his contention, that
by reason of the company's failure to comply with certain provisions of the
statutes of Kansas, it was not entitled to maintain this action in a court of
Kansas.

We will now refer to the provisions of the Kansas statute under which the Textbook Company was held not to be entitled to maintain the present action in the
courts of the state. The statute, the plaintiff alleges, cannot be applied to it
without violating its rights under the Constitution of the United States.

10

By 1260 of the Kansas General Statutes of 1901 it is provided, among other

things, that a corporation organized under the laws of any other state, territory,
or foreign country, and seeking to do business in Kansas, may make application
to the state charter board, composed of the attorney general, the secretary of
state, and the state bank commissioner, for 'permission' to engage in business in
that state as a foreign corporation. It is necessary that the application should be
accompanied by a fee of $25, and as a condition precedent to obtaining
authority to transact business in the state, a corporation of another state was
required to file in the office of the secretary of state its written consent,
irrevocable, that process against it might be served upon that officer. 1261. In
passing upon the application, the charter board is authorized to make special
inquiry in reference to the solvency of the corporation, and if they determind
that such corporation was properly organized in accordance with the laws under
which it was incorporated, 'that its capital is unimpaired, and that it is
organized for a purpose for which a domestic corporation may be organized' in
Kansas, then its application is to be granted, and a certificate issued, setting
forth the fact that 'the application has been granted, and that such foreign

corporation may engage in business in this state.' Before filing its charter, or a
certified copy thereof, with the secretary of state, the corporation is required to
pay to the state treasurer, for the benefit of the 'permanent school fund,' a
specified per cent of its capital stock. 1263, 1264. The last-named section
was the subject of extended examination in Western U. Teleg. Co. v. Kansas,
recently decided (216 U. S. 1, 54 L. ed. , 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 190), and was
held to be unconstitutional in its application to the Western Union Telegraph
Company, seeking to do local business in Kansas.
11

But the section which controlled the decision by the state court in the present
case is 1283, which is as follows: 'It shall be the duty of the president and
secretary or of the managing officer of each corporation for profit, doing
business in this state, except banking, insurance, and railroad corporations,
annually, on or before the 1st day of August, to prepare and deliver to the
secretary of state a complete detailed statement of the condition of such
corporation on the 30th day of June next preceding. Such statement shall set
forth and exhibit the following, namely: 1st. The authorized capital stock. 2d.
The paid-up capital stock. 3d. The par value and the market value per share of
said stock. 4th. A complete and detailed statement of the assets and liabilities of
the corporation. 5th. A full and complete list of the stockholders, with the
postoffice address of each, and the number of shares held and paid for by each.
6th. The names and postoffice addresses of the officers, trustees, or directors
and manager elected for the ensuing year, together with a certificate of the time
and manner in which such election was held . . . and the failure of any such
corporation to file the statement in this section provided for within ninety days
from the time provided for filing the same shall work the forfeiture of the
charter of any corporation organized under the laws of this state, and the charter
board may, at any time thereafter, declare the charter of such corporation
forfeited; and upon the declaration of any such forfeiture, it shall be the duty of
the attorney general to apply to the district court of the proper county for the
appointment of a receiver to close out the business of such corporation; and
such failure to file such statement by any corporation doing business in this
state, and not organized under the laws of this state, shall work a forfeiture of
its right or authority to do business in this state, and the charter board may at
any time declare such forfeiture, and shall forthwith publish such declaration in
the official state paper. . . . No action shall be maintained or recovery had in
any of the courts of this state by any corporation doing business in this state
without first obtaining the certificate of the secretary of state that statements
provided for in this section [ 1283] have been properly made.' Laws 1898,
chap. 10, 12, as amended by Laws 1901, chap. 125, 3.

12

1. In view of the nature and extent of the business of the International Text-

book Company of Kansas, the first inquiry is whether the statutory prohibition
against the maintaining of an action in a Kansas court by 'any corporation doing
business in this [that] state' embraces the plaintiff corporation. It must be held,
as the state court held, that it does; for it is conceded that the Text-book
Company did not, before bringing this suit, make, deliver, and file with the
secretary of state either the statement or certificate required by 1283; and
upon any reasonable interpretation of the statute, that company, both at the date
of the contract sued on, and when this action was brought, must be held as
'doing business' in Kansas. It had an agent in the state, who was employed to
secure scholars for the schools conducted by correspondence from Scranton,
and to receive and forward any money obtained from such scholars. Its
transactions in Kansas, by means of which it secured applications from
numerous persons for scholarships, were not single or casual transactions, such
as might be deemed incidental to its general business as a foreign corporation,
but were parts of its regular business continuously conducted in many states for
the benefit of its correspondence schools. While the supreme court of Kansas
has distinctly held that the statute did not embrace single transactions that were
only incidentally necessary to the business of a foreign corporation, it also
adjudged that the business done by the Text-book Company in Kansas was not
of that kind, but indicated a purpose to regularly transact its business from time
to time in Kansas, and therefore it was to be regarded as doing business in that
state, within the meaning of the statute; and that it 'was the intention of the
legislature that the state should reach every continuous exercise of a foreign
franchise,' and that it should apply even where the business of the foreign
corporation was 'purely interstate commerce.' John Deere Plow Co. v. Wyland,
69 Kan. 255, 257, 258, 76 Pac. 863, 2 A. & E. Ann. Cas. 304; State ex rel.
Shawnee County v. American Book Co. 65 Kan. 847, 69 Pac. 563; Thomas v.
Remington Paper Co. 67 Kan. 599, 73 Pac. 909; Sigel-Campion Live-stock
Commission Co. v. Haston, 68 Kan. 749, 75 Pac. 1028. In our judgment, those
rulings as to the scope of the statute were correct. They were in substantial
harmony with the construction placed by this court upon a Colorado statute
somewhat similar to the Kansas act. A statute passed in execution of a
provision in the Colorado Constitution required foreign corporations, as a
condition of their authority 'to do business' in that state, to make and file with
the secretary of state a certificate covering certain specified matters. An Ohio
corporation having made in Colorado a contract for the sale of machinery, to be
sent to it from the latter state to Ohio, and the vendor having failed to perform
the tract, a suit was brought against him in the Federal court, sitting in
Colorado. One of the defenses was the failure of the Ohio corporation to make
and file with the secretary of state the certificate required by the Colorado
statute before it should be 'authorized or permitted to do any business' in
Colorado. It became necessary to inquire whether the Ohio corporation, by
reason of the above isolated contract, did business in Colorado within the

meaning of the Constitution and laws of the latter state. This court said:
'Reasonably construed, the Constitution and statute of Colorado forbid, not the
doing of a single act of business in the state, but the carrying on of business by a
foreign corporation without the filing of the certificate and the appointment of
an agent, as required by the statute. . . . The making in Colorado of the one
contract sued on in this case, by which one party agreed to build and deliver in
Ohio certain machinery and the other party to pay for it, did not constitute a
carrying on of business in Colorado. . . . To require such a certificate as a
prerequisite to the doing of a single act of business when there was no purpose
to do any other business or have a place of business in the state would be
unreasonable and incongruous.' Cooper Mfg. Co. v. Ferguson, 113 U. S. 727,
728, 734, 28 L. ed. 1137, 1139, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 739, 741.
13

In view of the agreed facts and the principles announced both by the Kansas
supreme court and by this court, we hold that, within the meaning of 1283 of
the Kansas statute, the International Text-book Company was doing business in
the latter state at the time the contract in question was made, and was therefore
within the terms of that section.

14

2. But this view as to the meaning of the Kansas statute does not necessarily
lead to an affirmance of the judgment below, if, as the plaintiff contends, the
business in which it is regularly engaged is interstate in its nature, and if the
statute, by its necessary operation, materially or directly burdens that business.

15

It is true that the business in which the International Text-book Company is

engaged is of a somewhat exceptional character, but, in our judgment, it was, in
its essential characteristics, commerce among the states within the meaning of
the Constitution of the United States. It involved, as already suggested, regular
and practically continuous intercourse between the Text-book Company,
located in Pennsylvania, and its scholars and agents in Kansas and other states.
That intercourse was conducted by means of correspondence through the mails
with such agents and scholars. While this mode of imparting and acquiring an
education may not be such as is commonly adopted in this country, it is a
lawful mode to accomplish the valuable purpose the parties have in view. More
than that; this modelooking at the contracts between the Text-book Company
and its scholarsinvolved the transportation from the state where the school is
located to the state in which the scholar resides, of books, apparatus, and
papers, useful or necessary in the particular course of study the scholar is
pursuing, and in respect of which he is entitled, from time to time, by virtue of
his contract, to information and direction. Intercourse of that kind, between
parties in different states,particularly when it is in execution of a valid
contract between them,is as much intercourse in the constitutional sense, as

intercourse by means of the telegraph,'a new species of commerce,' to use the

words of this court in Pensacola Teleg. Co. v. Western U. Teleg. Co. 96 U. S. 1,
9, 24 L. ed. 708, 710. In the great case of Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1, 189, 6
L. ed. 23, 68, this court, speaking by Chief Justice Marshall, said: 'Commerce,
undoubtedly, is traffic; but it is something more; it is intercourse.' Referring to
the constitutional power of Congress to regulate commerce among the states
and with foreign countries, this court said in the Pensacola Case, just cited, that
'it is not only the right, but the duty, of Congress, to see to it that intercourse
among the states and the transmission of intelligence state legislation.' This
principle has never been modified by any subsequent decision of this court.
16

The same thought was expressed in Western U. Teleg. Co. v. Pendleton, 122 U.
S. 347, 356, 30 L. ed. 1187, 1188, 1 Inters. Com. Rep. 306, 307, 7 Sup. Ct.
Rep. 1126, 1127, where the court said: 'Other commerce deals only with
persons, or with visible and tangible things. But the telegraph transports
nothing visible and tangible; it carries only ideas, wishes, orders, and
intelligence.' It was said in the circuit court of appeals for the eighth circuit,
speaking by Judge Sanborn, in Butler Bros. Shoe Co. v. United States Rubber
Co. 84 C. C. A. 167, 183, 156 Fed. 1, 17, that 'all interstate commerce is not
sales of goods. Importation into one state from another is the indispensable
element, the test, of interstate commerce; and every negotiation, contract, trade,
and dealing between citizens of different states, which contemplates and causes
such importation, whether it be of goods, persons, or information, is a
transaction of interstate commerce.' If intercourse between persons in different
states by means of telegraphic messages conveying intelligence or information
is commerce among the states, which no state may directly burden or
unnecessarily encumber, we cannot doubt that intercourse or communication
between persons in different states, by means of correspondence through the
mails, is commerce among the states within the meaning of the Constitution,
especially where, as here, such intercourse and communication really relate to
matters of regular, continuous business, and to the making of contracts and the
transportation of books, papers, etc., appertaining to such business. In our
further consideration of this case, we shall therefore assume that the business of
the Text-book Company, by means of correspondence through the mails and
otherwise between Kansas and Pennsylvania, was interstate in its nature.

17

3. We must next inquire whether the statute of Kansas, if applied to the

International Text-book Company, would directly burden its right by means of
correspondence through the mails and by its agents, to secure written
agreements with persons in other states, whereby such persons, for a valuable
consideration, contract to pay a given amount for scholarships in its
correspondence schools, and to have sent to them, as found necessary, from

time to time, books, papers, apparatus, and information, needed in the

prosecution, in their respective states, of the particular study which the scholar
has elected to pursue under the guidance of those who conduct such schools at
Scranton? Let us see what effect the statute, by its necessary operation, must
have on the conduct of the company's business.
18

In the first place, it is made a condition precedent to the authority of a

corporation of another state, except banking, insurance, and railroad
corporations, to do business in Kansas, that it shall prepare, deliver, and file
with the secretary of state a detailed 'statement,' showing the amount of the
authorized, paid-up, par, and market value of, its capital stock, its assets and
liabilities, a list of its stockholders, with their respective postoffice addresses,
and the shares held and paid for by each, and the names and postoffice
addresses of the officers, trustees, or directors and managers.

19

In the next place, the statute denies to the corporation doing business in Kansas
the right to maintain an action in a Kansas court, unless it shall first obtain a
certificate of the secretary of state to the effect that the statement required by
1283 has been properly made.

20

Was it competent for the state to prescribe, as a condition of the right of the
Text-book Company to do interstate business in Kansas, such as was transacted
with Pigg, that it should prepare, deliver, and file with the secretary of state the
statement mentioned in 1283? The above question must be answered in the
negative upon the authority of former adjudications by this court. A case in
point is Crutcher v. Kentucky, 141 U. S. 47, 56, 57, 35 L. ed. 649, 652, 11 Sup.
Ct. Rep. 851, 853, 854, often referred to and never qualified by any subsequent
decision. That case arose under a statute of Kentucky regulating agencies of
foreign express companies. The statute required as a condition of the right of
the agent of an express company not incorporated by the laws of Kentucky, to
do business in that commonwealth, to take out a license from the state auditor,
and to make and file in the auditor's office a statement showing that the
company had an actual capital of a given amount, either in cash or in safe
investments, exclusive of costs. These requirements were held by this court to
be in violation of the Constitution of the United States in their application to
foreign corporations engaged in interstate commerce. The court said: 'If the
subject was one which appertained to the jurisdiction of the state legislature, it
may be that the requirements and conditions of doing business within the state
would be promotive of the public good. It is clear, however, that it would be a
regulation of interstate commerce in its application to corporations or
associations engaged in that business; and that is a subject with belongs to the
jurisdiction of the national, and not the state, legislature. Congress would

undoubtedly have the right to exact from associations of that kind any
guaranties it might deem necessary for the public security, and for the faithful
transaction of business; and as it is within the province of Congress, it is to be
presumed that Congress has done, or will do, all that is necessary and proper in
that regard. Besides, it is not to be presumed that the state of its origin has
neglected to require from any such corporation proper guaranties as to capital
and other securities necessary for the public safety. If a partnership firm of
individuals should undertake to carry on the business of interstate commerce
between Kentucky and other states, it would not be within the province of the
state legislature to exact conditions on which they should carry on their
business, nor to require them to take out a license therefor. To carry on
interstate commerce is not a franchise or a privilege granted by the state; it is a
right which every citizen of the United States is entitled to exercise under the
Constitution and laws of the United States; and the accession of mere corporate
facilities, as matter of convenience in carrying on their business, cannot have
the effect of depriving them of such right, unless Congress should see fit to
interpose some contrary regulation on the subject.' Again, in the same case:
'Would anyone pretend that a state legislature could prohibit a foreign
corporationan English or a French transportation company, for example
from coming into its borders and landing goods and passengers at its wharves,
and soliciting goods and passengers for a return voyage, without first obtaining
a license from some state officer, and filing a sworn statement as to the amount
of its capital stock paid in? And why not? Evidently because the matter is not
within the province of state legislation, but within that of national legislation.'
Further, in the same case: 'We do not think that the difficulty is at all obviated
by the fact that the express company, as incidental to its main business (which
is to carry goods between different states), does also some local business by
carrying goods from one point to another within the state of Kentucky. This is,
probably, quite as much for the accommodation of the people of that state as
for the advantage of the company. But whether so or not, it does not obviate the
objection that the regulation as to license and capital stock are imposed as
conditions on the company's carrying on the business of interstate commerce,
which was manifestly the principal object of its organization. These regulations
are clearly a burden and a restriction upon that commerce. Whether intended
as such or not, they operate as such. But taxes or license fees, in good faith
imposed exclusively on express business carried on wholly within the state,
would be open to no such objection.' To the same general effect are many other
cases. Robbins v. Taxing Dist. 120 U. S. 489, 30 L. ed. 694, 1 Inters. Com.
Rep. 45, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 592; Leloup v. Mobile, 127 U. S. 640, 32 L. ed. 311, 2
Inters. Com. Rep. 134, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1383; Stoutenburgh v. Hennick, 129 U.
S. 141, 32 L. ed. 637, 9 Sup. Ct. Rep. 256; Lyng v. Michigan, 135 U. S. 166, 34
L. ed. 153, 3 Inters. Com. Rep. 143, 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 725; McCall v.
California, 136 U. S. 104, 34 L. ed. 391, 3 Inters. Com. Rep. 181, 10 Sup. Ct.

Rep. 881; Norfolk & W. R. Co. v. Pennsylvania, 136 U. S. 114, 34 L. ed. 394,
3 Inters. Com. Rep. 178, 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 958; Western U. Teleg. Co. v.
Kansas, 216 U. S. 1, 54 L. ed. , 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 190. It is true that the
statute does not, in terms, require the corporation of another state engaged in
interstate commerce to take out what is technically 'a license' to transact its
business in Kansas. But it denies all authority to do business in Kansas unless
the corporation makes, delivers, and files a 'statement' of the kind mentioned in
1283. The effect of such requirement is practically the same as if a formal
license was required as a condition precedent to the right to do such business. In
either case it imposes a condition upon a corporation of another state seeking to
do business in Kansas, which, in the case of interstate business, is a regulation
of interstate commerce and directly burdens such commerce. The state cannot
thus burden interstate commerce. It follows that the particular clause of 1283
requiring that 'statement' is illegal and void.
21

In this connection it is to be observed that by the statute the doors of Kansas

courts are closed against the Text-book Company, unless it first obtains from
the secretary of state a certificate showing that the 'statement' mentioned in
1283 has been properly made. In other words, although the Text-book
Company may have a valid contract with a citizen of Kansas, one directly
arising out of and connected with its interstate business, the statute denies its
right to invoke the authority of a Kansas court to enforce its provisions unless it
does what we hold it was not, under the Constitution, bound to do; namely,
make, deliver, and file with the secretary of state the statement required by
1283. If the state could, under any circumstances, legally forbid its courts from
taking jurisdiction of a suit brought by a corporation of another state, engaged
in interstate business, upon a valid contract arising out of such business, and
made with it by a citizen of Kansas, it could not impose on the company, as a
condition of its authority to carry on its interstate business in Kansas, that it
shall make, deliver, and file that statement with the secretary of state, and
obtain his certificate that it had been properly made. This court held in
Chambers v. Baltimore & O. R. Co. 207 U. S. 142, 148, 52 L. ed. 143, 146, 28
Sup. Ct. Rep. 34, that a state may, subject to the restrictions of the Federal
Constitution, 'determine the limits of the jurisdiction of its courts, and the
character of the controversies which shall be heard in them.' But it also said in
the same case: 'The right to sue and defend in the courts is the alternative of
force. In an organized society it is the right conservative of all other rights, and
lies at the foundation of orderly government. It is one of the highest and most
essential privileges of citizenship, and must be allowed by each state to the
citizens of all other states to the precise extent that it is allowed to its own
citizens. Equality of treatment in this respect is not left to depend upon comity
between the states, but is granted and protected by the Federal Constitution.'

How far a corporation of one state is entitled to claim in another state, where it
is doing business, equality of treatment with individual citizens in respect of the
right to sue and defend in the courts, is a question which the exigencies of this
case do not require to be definitely decided. It is sufficient to say that the
requirement of the statement mentioned in 1283 of the statute imposes a
direct burden on the plaintiff's right to engage in interstate business, and
therefore is in violation of its constitutional rights. It is the established doctrine
of this court that a state may not, in any form or under any guise, directly
burden the prosecution of interstate business. But such a burden is imposed
when the corporation of another state, lawfully engaged in interstate commerce,
is required, as a condition of its right to prosecute its business in Kansas, to
make and file a statement setting forth certain facts which the state,
confessedly, could not control by legislation. It results that the provision as to
the statement mentioned in 1283 must fall before the Constitution of the
United States, and with itaccording to the established rules of statutory
constructionmust fall that part of the same section which provides that the
obtaining of the certificate of the secretary of state that such statement has been
properly made shall be a condition precedent to the right of the plaintiff to
maintain an action in the courts of Kansas. Section 1283, looking at the object
for which it was enacted, must be regarded as an entirety. These parts of the
statute are so connected with and dependent upon each other that the clause
relating to actions brought in the courts of Kansas cannot be separated from the
prior clause in the same section, referring to the statement to be filed with the
secretary of state, and the former left in force after the latter is stricken down as
invalid. As the clause about suits in the courts of Kansas expressly refers to the
prior clauses in the same section prescribing the statement to be filed with the
secretary of state, the clause relating to suits would be meaningless without
reference to the latter. We cannot suppose, from the words of the statute, that
the legislature would have adopted the regulation about actions in the state
courts, except for the purpose of enforcing the prior clause in the same section,
relating to the statement to be filed with the secretary of state. The several parts
of the section are not capable of separation if effect be given to the legislative
intent. It is well settled that if a statute is in part unconstitutional, the whole
statute must be deemed invalid, if the parts not held to be invalid are so
connected with the general scope of the statute that they cannot be separately
enforced, or, if so enforced, will not effectuate the manifest intent of the
legislature. In Allen v. Louisiana, 103 U. S. 80, 84, 26 L. ed. 318, 319, this
court referred with approval to what Chief Justice Shaw said on this point in
Warren v. Charlestown, 2 Gray, 84. Referring to the rule obtaining in cases of
statutes in part constitutional and in part unconstitutional, that eminent jurist
said: 'But, if they are so mutually connected with and dependent on each other,
as conditions, considerations, or compensations for each other, as to warrant a
belief that the legislature intended them as a whole, and that, if all could not be

carried into effect, the legislature would not pass the residue independently, and
some parts are unconstitutional, all the provisions which are thus dependent,
conditional, or connected, must fall with them.' See also Poindexter v.
Greenhow, 114 U. S. 270, 29 L. ed. 185, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 903, 962; Spraigue v.
Thompson, 118 U. S. 90, 30 L. ed. 115, 6 Sup. Ct. Rep. 988; Huntington v.
Worthen, 120 U. S. 97, 30 L. ed. 588, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 469.
22

It results that as the part of 1283 which relates to the statement to be filed
with the secretary is unconstitutional, and as the clause in the same section,
relating to suits in the state court, is so dependent upon and connected with that
part as to be meaningless when standing alone, the section must be held
inoperative in all its parts, and as not being in the way of the enforcement in
any state court of competent jurisdiction of the plaintiff's right to a judgment
against the defendant for the amount conceded to be due from him to the
Textbook Company under his contract. The judgment must be reversed and the
case remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

23

Mr. Justice Moody heard the argument of this case, participated in its decision
in conference, and approves the reversal of the judgment upon the grounds
stated in this opinion.

24

The CHIEF JUSTICE and Mr. Justice McKenna dissent. dissent.

25

Reversed.